Group of friends has met 27 times a year -- for more than 40 years

Sunday

Jan 20, 2013 at 12:01 AMJan 20, 2013 at 3:23 PM

They call themselves "the Lunch Bunch." The group of former Cherryville High School students meets once per month to have lunch, talk and reminisce about old times. In the fall, they travel together to Myrtle Beach for their annual reunions.

Molly Phipps / mphipps@shelbystar.com

They call themselves "the Lunch Bunch."

The group of former Cherryville High School students meets once per month to have lunch, talk and reminisce about old times. In the fall, they travel together to Myrtle Beach for their annual reunions.

They are the class of 1960, a hilarious bunch with a wealth of Cherryville history in their memories.

Dartha Stroupe, a Cherryville High graduate, is the spearhead of the group.

When I went to interview her, she had corralled the entire committee, complete with old yearbooks and photographs of their meetings. The committee includes Dartha , her husband, Dwight; Charles and Charlene Sisk ; Brenda and Jim Belt; Tommy and Joyce Peeler; and Jerry and Anne Walker.

“Our committee meets for breakfast once per month,” said Dartha, in addition to the lunch meetings for the whole group.

Those meetings got their start more than 40 years ago.

“In 1965, we had our first reunion,” Dartha said. “We voted before we graduated that we would have class reunions every five years.”

But then they realized that five years wasn’t quite enough. They decided to have reunions every year and have done so for more than 10 years. They also started having monthly meetings, always on the first Thursday of the month.

'We are constantly looking for people'

At their monthly meetings, they eat lunch, play games, share something they’ve read, or just sit and talk.

“We meet, eat and greet,” said Brenda Belt. They also have door prizes.

“We meet 27 times a year,” said Jim Belt, counting the lunch and breakfast meetings, the fall reunion and the holidays.

The bunch meets for Christmas, the fourth of July, Martin Luther King Day and other holidays.

And for the past eight years, they have traveled to Myrtle Beach for their reunions, where they have dinner, luncheons, Saturday morning beach walks and games. They had sweatshirts made one year for each of them to take to the beach.

For their next reunion, Dartha said, “We haven’t settled on plans for this year.” But the committee is traveling to the mountains Jan. 28 and 29, to try out the area and see if it fits.

They're a close bunch, and they always have been.

“It wasn’t just high school; it was grade school,” said Dartha , “We were real close all through school.”

That closeness has translated to others, even non-classmates. “You could get all of us together and not tell the difference,” said Dartha .

They invite anyone who attended a Cherryville school to their meetings, and they welcome spouses and family members.

“Anybody that we can find that was ever in class with us, we invite them,” Dartha said, “We are constantly looking for people.”

Some of their members were not even Cherryville High students.

“We’ve got people that come to our reunions and don’t go to theirs,” she said.

One of their member's granddaughters came to lunch and had a blast. Dartha said her granddaughter tries to miss a few days of school each year so she can go to the beach along with them.

They have widows and widowers who come as well, even without their spouses who were classmates.

“One of our members, her sister graduated the year we did and she still comes,” said Dartha .

Friends come from near and far

Altogether, their reunions have drawn almost 70 people.

“We have had as many as 45 come to lunch,” said Dartha .

Their members come from across the nation.

“One comes every year from Mississippi,” said Dartha. “We found him and they started coming ever since.”

The member who travels the farthest is from San Francisco, Calif.

In a quiet voice, Dartha tells me that 16 of their classmates are now deceased. For memorial services, “We make certain there’s someone representing the class,” said Dartha .

They offer support to their fellow members and even make donations to charity.

If a member is sick, “We sign get-well cards and send those out,” said Dartha .

“We also help classmates with financial problems,” Jim said.

And they keep their ties to the high school.

“The class raised money to buy a trophy cabinet for the high school,” Jim said.

Memories of school days

That school today is a bit different from the one they remember.

In 1960, Cherryville High was in front of the ball field in Cherryville . But about 1980, that building was torn down and the new high school was constructed. The old auditorium,Starnes , still stands, along with the old gymnasium. Both are still in use.

The old school also had class colors and a class flower for each year. The Class of 1960’s colors were red and white, and their class flower was the red rose. At each meeting, they bring a sign that shows their class colors and flower, so that people know who they are.

Their graduating class had 78 students.

Those students offer a portal into Cherryville’s history. They once called sodas "dopes."

They also remember when glass milk bottles were delivered to their doors — “My uncle was a milkman,” said Charlene — and when Cherryville was home to two movie theaters and a drive in. “I went every Saturday,” she said. Charlene said she was a "back-alley kid" who lived above one of the stores in uptown Cherryville .

They also remember when the town had two hotels and a skating rink at Black’s Grill, and when the skating rink fell in, in 1960.

Back then, Cherryville had a Belk’s , as well as other department stores, and three car dealerships. Gas was 25 cents per gallon.

“You could buy a drink for 5 cents and crackers for 5 cents,” said Tommy Peeler. The tax was one penny. As kids, they would get around the tax by buying the drink first, leaving the store, then coming back in to buy the crackers.

Another part of their memory is their teachers. The classmates remember their favorite (and least favorite) teachers over the years.

“Our perfect teacher was Mrs. Vera B. Hoyle,” said Brenda.

“She was strict, expected perfection,” said Dartha , “But people respected her because of her ability to teach. If you left her class, you learned.”

By request, I won’t publish their least favorite teacher, or the name of the teacher who once threw a potato at Jerry.

'I enjoy every minute of it'

Jerry is one of the members of the group’s band, the Cherry Pickers. He plays the banjo, Jim plays guitar, and Dennis Rayfield plays the harmonica. They travel to area churches a few times per month, and Brenda sings, sometimes dressing up as a hillbilly, complete with buck teeth.

You can tell they are one of the most fun bunches you will ever meet. They reminisced about old times, talked about how Anne got stuck in Dillard’s, joked about a member who, at 70, bought a Corvette, and one member even broke out into dance.

“Nobody’s drinking, but we have the most fun,” Jim said. “I enjoy every minute of it. I feel like I graduated with them.”

Jim pointed out that the fun of the group wouldn’t be possible without Dartha .

“If it hadn’t been for ( Dartha ) and Juanita Craig, we wouldn’t have all this,” he said.

Jim, the technological one of the group, documents their meetings and reunions, compiling the photos into a video each year.

The group still counts themselves students of Cherryville High School.

Charlene said, “I was a student;" Jerry said, “Not was, she still is.”

The groups next meeting will be Feb. 7.

And in the hometown-friendly spirit of Cherryville , Brenda told me, “You are more than welcome to come.”